Guerrilla Marketers of the Year: Cannes to Claims - A Case Study

The insurance and movie industries have long been linked, thanks to those crudely shot, safety gore classics that show distracted workers putting their eyes out with drill presses or paying the ultimate price for driving on bald tires. Still, bona fide films are seldom, if ever, marketed to this trade.

Double Edge Films screened its short flick Blanston - which details a plausible scam perpetrated by four agency employees - not on the Cannes circuit, but to the claims crowd. The caper was pitched to underwriters as a case study and training tool. (On one disc extra, the film's technical advisor, insurance investigator David Beacom, discusses internal fraud.) The provocative tag for Double Edge's campaign: "What are your employees up to?"

By going guerrilla, Blanston got ink in trade mags Claims and Business Insurance, plus a plug on the National Underwriters site. It was also showcased at a Professional Investigative Engineers conference. As a result of the raves, Commonwealth Automobile Reinsurers, Workers Compensation Fund and others have purchased the DVD. A cable station has even inquired about airing Blanston, perhaps because of the quirky press pickups.

When Double Edge pitched Blanston and The Maze to The Cable Center, "They were willing to negotiate [on-location] facility rates for our latest feature, 11:59," said Wendy Manning, pr director for the Denver studio. "We quantify success as exposure that ultimately equates to more opportunities."